Journalists at the Los Angeles Times, Tronc’s largest property, have questioned whether the company’s executives are making decisions in their own interest rather than the best interest of the paper’s journalism or the company’s shareholders.

In a previous job, Levinsohn successfully urged his corporate employers to acquire a company that he helped found. Similarly, while he was working for Tronc as a consultant, Levinsohn introduced Tronc executives to the CEO of another startup he co-founded. That CEO sought to persuade Tronc to invest in the startup.
In his current role, as CEO of Tronc’s digital division, Levinsohn stands …

It turns out, where Puerto Ricans are concerned, there’s added reason for suspicion. Puerto Ricans’ identities are especially valuable, because they’re U.S. citizens — with Social Security numbers — and Spanish names.

In a federal case against an alleged Puerto Rican identity trafficking ring, law enforcement agents found that a set that included a birth certificate and Social Security card could fetch up to $2,500 on the black market. With that, an undocumented immigrant from South or Central America could obtain work authorization, a line of credit or even a U.S. …

As anyone who has reported on or closely followed the Emanuel campaign can attest, the candidate has been extremely reluctant to give specific answers to almost any question, speaking haltingly and in generalized platitudes. Yet via campaign spokesman and former White House staffer Ben LaBolt, he did make a specific pledge in response to this blog’s reporting on his ties to Ticketmaster/Live Nation and Lollapalooza—“Given his brother’s position at WME [William Morris Endeavor] and on the board of Live Nation, Rahm would ask the City Council to appoint an outside negotiator …

For knowledgeable music fans, two things jump out from the list of donors to the campaign of mayoral frontrunner Rahm Emanuel. The first is the contributions from the two top executives at Ticketmaster/Live Nation, the monopolistic giant that has become the most reviled entity in the music business.

Executive chairman Irving Azoff, the notorious “Poison Dwarf” of the music industry and a man who’s been pushing concert ticket prices ever higher since he started as manager of the Eagles, gave the campaign $10,000. And CEO Michael Rapino, as ruthless a figure …